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Gaming the Vote: Why Elections Aren't Fair
Our Electoral System is Fundamentally Flawed, But There's a Simple and Fair Solution
At least five U.S. presidential elections have been won by the second most popular candidate. The reason was a "spoiler"--a minor candidate who takes enough votes away from the most popular candidate to tip the election to someone else. The spoiler effect is more than a glitch. It is a consequence of one of the most surprising intellectual discoveries of the twentieth the "impossibility theorem" of Nobel laureate economist Kenneth Arrow. The impossibility theorem asserts that voting is fundamentally unfair--a finding that has not been lost on today's political consultants. Armed with polls, focus groups, and smear campaigns, political strategists are exploiting the mathematical faults of the simple majority vote. In recent election cycles, this has led to such unlikely tactics as Republicans funding ballot drives for Green spoilers and Democrats paying for right-wing candidates' radio ads. Gaming the Vote shows that there is a solution to the spoiler problem that will satisfy both right and left. A system
called range voting, already widely used on the Internet, is the fairest voting method of all, according to computer studies. Despite these findings, range voting remains controversial, and Gaming the Vote assesses the obstacles confronting any attempt to change the American electoral system. The latest of several books by William Poundstone on the theme of how important scientific ideas have affected the real world, Gaming the Vote is a wry exposé of how the political system really works, and a call to action.
At least five U.S. presidential elections have been won by the second most popular candidate. The reason was a "spoiler"--a minor candidate who takes enough votes away from the most popular candidate to tip the election to someone else. The spoiler effect is more than a glitch. It is a consequence of one of the most surprising intellectual discoveries of the twentieth the "impossibility theorem" of Nobel laureate economist Kenneth Arrow. The impossibility theorem asserts that voting is fundamentally unfair--a finding that has not been lost on today's political consultants. Armed with polls, focus groups, and smear campaigns, political strategists are exploiting the mathematical faults of the simple majority vote. In recent election cycles, this has led to such unlikely tactics as Republicans funding ballot drives for Green spoilers and Democrats paying for right-wing candidates' radio ads. Gaming the Vote shows that there is a solution to the spoiler problem that will satisfy both right and left. A system
called range voting, already widely used on the Internet, is the fairest voting method of all, according to computer studies. Despite these findings, range voting remains controversial, and Gaming the Vote assesses the obstacles confronting any attempt to change the American electoral system. The latest of several books by William Poundstone on the theme of how important scientific ideas have affected the real world, Gaming the Vote is a wry exposé of how the political system really works, and a call to action.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published February 5, 2008
23 people are currently reading
598 people want to read
About the author
William Poundstone
55 books365 followersWilliam Poundstone is the author of more than ten non-fiction books, including 'Fortune's Formula', which was the Amazon Editors' Pick for #1 non-fiction book of 2005. Poundstone has written for The New York Times, Psychology Today, Esquire, Harpers, The Economist, and Harvard Business Review. He has appeared on the Today Show, The David Letterman Show and hundreds of radio talk-shows throughout the world. Poundstone studied physics at MIT and many of his ideas concern the social and financial impact of scientific ideas. His books have sold over half a million copies worldwide.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 66 reviews
May 22, 2008
Most books that attempt to propose new ways of carrying out elections are nothing more than sour grapes: "Since *my* guy didn't win the last election, the system is obviously flawed and should be overhauled." Therefore, most of these sort of books are a waste of time. This one, however, is simply brilliant. Instead of approaching the subject through party results, Poundstone instead takes a historical walk through many different voting schemes in terms of the mathematical theory behind them. Don't be scared by the word "mathematical", by the way...Poundstone not only steers clear of intense mathematics but also provides a simple glossary to help you remember something you may have forgotten from earlier pages. While I think I can determine his political leanings from a couple of different allusions, he makes such a good argument and has such an engaging style of writing that it doesn't matter. There were several times when I noticed a flaw in the argumentation and Poundstone responds to the particular question on the VERY NEXT page. Any author that can read the mind of an informed reader is doing a good job indeed. :) Anyone who's interested in the process of voting should read this one because it's the best of its kind.
November 12, 2012
The first half is a bit repetitive, mostly just a run-down of past US elections ruined by "spoiler" candidates. The second half gets more interesting with a description of different voting methods and the ways in which they could be implemented in the US. A proponent of "range voting," Mr. Poundstone spends quite a bit of time on its merits and almost completely disregards the extreme manipulability of the system. He barely mentions its logical sister, majority judgment, which carries all of the same merits of range voting without the same manipulability and seems to be a far more practicable solution (or maybe I'm just more of a Balinski girl). One wonders, of course, if Brams would have given this book such a glowing review had he done so...
All told it was superbly readable and although I'm familiar with the various theorems and voting systems it was refreshing to see them applied to real-world situations. One can get lost in the math and logic and forget the actual ramifications.
All told it was superbly readable and although I'm familiar with the various theorems and voting systems it was refreshing to see them applied to real-world situations. One can get lost in the math and logic and forget the actual ramifications.
September 25, 2015
“Gaming the Vote: Why Elections Aren’t Fair (and What We Can Do About It)” is an entertaining primer on the craziness of our usual method of running elections in this country and the various alternative methods proposed to replace it. Long on anecdotes and short on in-depth analysis, it whets the desire for electoral reform without making a definitive case for “what we can do about it.”
Not that it doesn’t reach a conclusion. The book was recommended to me by an online acquaintance who takes issue with my promotion of ranked choice voting (called instant runoff voting in this book) and argues that range voting is superior. The book does come down on the side of range voting as worth a try, which is a tepid recommendation. It made me want to learn more about range voting, but the contents of the book were insufficient to get me to give up my efforts on behalf of ranked choice.
Our current electoral system is bedeviled by the “spoiler” effect, which can (and often does) result in a candidate winning even though a majority of voters are opposed to that candidate. The 2000 Presidential election is often presented as a spoiler election (I am not so sure, but it makes for a familiar illustration). George W. Bush won with a minority of the votes, even though the combined majority of voters for Ralph Nader and Al Gore were opposed to Bush.
There are plenty of other examples if you look for them, and the author, William Poundstone, is deft at picking the most colorful ones to make his point. The most literally colorful is the case of “the Blue Man,” whose skin turned blue from drinking what he believed is a “natural” antibiotic. His hopeless 2006 campaign for U.S. Senator in Montana (he got 2.55% of the total vote) resulted in the Republican loss of a majority in the Senate.
Poundstone describes the shady maneuvering of politicians and their consultants to exploit this electoral flaw, but probably no reasonably intelligent observer needs to be convinced that something is wrong with our electoral system. The first section of the book describing the problem is thus overkill. It is the second part, on the proposed alternative electoral systems, that is the meat of the book.
He runs through the most prominent alternatives, doing a good job of making it clear how they differ and keeping the reader’s interest with stories of the history of electoral reform debates. He raises problems with each of them, lending weight to Professor Kenneth Arrow’s famous dictum that there is no perfect democratic electoral system. The consensus of those who have looked into the issue is that the system we now have may well be the worst of the lot. But what should we replace it with?
What the alternatives offer is the opportunity for voters to give more information about their desires. One set of proposals allows voters to rank candidates according to each voter’s preferences. This set includes ranked choice voting, as well as the Condorcet and Borda voting methods. They are all subject to a flaw known as cycling, which in particular (hopefully rare) circumstances can produce results that defy our notions of fairness. Professor Arrow’s dictum was based on studying these systems, and resulted in what is known as the “Impossibility Theorem.”
The second set of proposals, however, takes a different tack. This set is based on voters rating each candidate, and includes both approval voting and range voting. Approval voting lets a voter give a straight thumbs up-or-down for each candidate, and has some serious recognized flaws. Range voting lets you rank each candidate on a scale, such as from zero to ten. It may well escape the Impossibility Theorem.
Without going into all the arguments, suffice to say that the debate has narrowed down to a competition between ranked choice voting and range voting. Ranked choice voting is superior to our current system and has the advantage that it already has a lot of political support and is making headway in the U.S. Range voting may have the advantage that it is the best of all the systems generally proposed—if its proponents are correct.
It is hard to judge whether they are right without a more in-depth study of the question. The primary evidence for its superiority is a computer simulation of all of the alternatives under various assumptions that found that voters would have the least reason to regret the outcomes of range voting. I would need two things to be persuaded that this analysis is correct. One is to examine the parameters that the simulation was built on, along with hard thinking about whether it missed anything important. The other is more testing of the method, not only in corroborating computer simulations but in real life.
Lacking that information, I rely for a first impression on imagining how I would respond to a ballot using alternative electoral methods. In instant runoff voting the voter needs to rank the candidates in order of preference: I like this one the best, this one second best, this one third best, and so forth, stopping at any point one chooses to. Range voting requires the voter to give a rating to each of the candidates (or as many as the voter wants to rate): this one is a six, this one a ten, this one a zero, and so forth.
To me, the ranked choice ballot is doable. I can pretty easily order my preferences for most of the candidates. The range voting ballot makes me have to think harder. The candidate I like best is easy: I give the highest possible rating. And the candidate I like least I give the lowest rating. But what about candidates in the middle? A six? A four? A seven or five? Not only do I need to think about how much I like them, I have to think about how my rating might affect the race overall.
Poundstone claims the rating system is easy for people because we do it all the time: rating books on Amazon for example, or movies on IMDb. But that’s because the implications of your rating in the latter cases are inconsequential. People feel how they vote is more important than how they rate a book, movie, or hotel, and thus the decision takes more thought. Maybe too much thought for most of us.
Whatever the merits of this reservation, I am intellectually intrigued enough to look into range voting further, but on a practical level I still find ranked choice voting the more attractive alternative. Ranked choice voting is better known, it has a political support infrastructure, and it has been tested a lot in the real world. (It has been used in other parts of the world for many decades.)
“Gaming the Vote” makes a good case for changing our electoral system, but it also inadvertently makes the case that theoretical debates about the best system may go on for a long, long time. To make headway the proponents of range voting will need to build political and intellectual support for the method, which is also going to take time (not to mention money and political skill).
We don’t have to wait that long to make things better. There is another dictum that applies here. It’s the old adage, “don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good."
Not that it doesn’t reach a conclusion. The book was recommended to me by an online acquaintance who takes issue with my promotion of ranked choice voting (called instant runoff voting in this book) and argues that range voting is superior. The book does come down on the side of range voting as worth a try, which is a tepid recommendation. It made me want to learn more about range voting, but the contents of the book were insufficient to get me to give up my efforts on behalf of ranked choice.
Our current electoral system is bedeviled by the “spoiler” effect, which can (and often does) result in a candidate winning even though a majority of voters are opposed to that candidate. The 2000 Presidential election is often presented as a spoiler election (I am not so sure, but it makes for a familiar illustration). George W. Bush won with a minority of the votes, even though the combined majority of voters for Ralph Nader and Al Gore were opposed to Bush.
There are plenty of other examples if you look for them, and the author, William Poundstone, is deft at picking the most colorful ones to make his point. The most literally colorful is the case of “the Blue Man,” whose skin turned blue from drinking what he believed is a “natural” antibiotic. His hopeless 2006 campaign for U.S. Senator in Montana (he got 2.55% of the total vote) resulted in the Republican loss of a majority in the Senate.
Poundstone describes the shady maneuvering of politicians and their consultants to exploit this electoral flaw, but probably no reasonably intelligent observer needs to be convinced that something is wrong with our electoral system. The first section of the book describing the problem is thus overkill. It is the second part, on the proposed alternative electoral systems, that is the meat of the book.
He runs through the most prominent alternatives, doing a good job of making it clear how they differ and keeping the reader’s interest with stories of the history of electoral reform debates. He raises problems with each of them, lending weight to Professor Kenneth Arrow’s famous dictum that there is no perfect democratic electoral system. The consensus of those who have looked into the issue is that the system we now have may well be the worst of the lot. But what should we replace it with?
What the alternatives offer is the opportunity for voters to give more information about their desires. One set of proposals allows voters to rank candidates according to each voter’s preferences. This set includes ranked choice voting, as well as the Condorcet and Borda voting methods. They are all subject to a flaw known as cycling, which in particular (hopefully rare) circumstances can produce results that defy our notions of fairness. Professor Arrow’s dictum was based on studying these systems, and resulted in what is known as the “Impossibility Theorem.”
The second set of proposals, however, takes a different tack. This set is based on voters rating each candidate, and includes both approval voting and range voting. Approval voting lets a voter give a straight thumbs up-or-down for each candidate, and has some serious recognized flaws. Range voting lets you rank each candidate on a scale, such as from zero to ten. It may well escape the Impossibility Theorem.
Without going into all the arguments, suffice to say that the debate has narrowed down to a competition between ranked choice voting and range voting. Ranked choice voting is superior to our current system and has the advantage that it already has a lot of political support and is making headway in the U.S. Range voting may have the advantage that it is the best of all the systems generally proposed—if its proponents are correct.
It is hard to judge whether they are right without a more in-depth study of the question. The primary evidence for its superiority is a computer simulation of all of the alternatives under various assumptions that found that voters would have the least reason to regret the outcomes of range voting. I would need two things to be persuaded that this analysis is correct. One is to examine the parameters that the simulation was built on, along with hard thinking about whether it missed anything important. The other is more testing of the method, not only in corroborating computer simulations but in real life.
Lacking that information, I rely for a first impression on imagining how I would respond to a ballot using alternative electoral methods. In instant runoff voting the voter needs to rank the candidates in order of preference: I like this one the best, this one second best, this one third best, and so forth, stopping at any point one chooses to. Range voting requires the voter to give a rating to each of the candidates (or as many as the voter wants to rate): this one is a six, this one a ten, this one a zero, and so forth.
To me, the ranked choice ballot is doable. I can pretty easily order my preferences for most of the candidates. The range voting ballot makes me have to think harder. The candidate I like best is easy: I give the highest possible rating. And the candidate I like least I give the lowest rating. But what about candidates in the middle? A six? A four? A seven or five? Not only do I need to think about how much I like them, I have to think about how my rating might affect the race overall.
Poundstone claims the rating system is easy for people because we do it all the time: rating books on Amazon for example, or movies on IMDb. But that’s because the implications of your rating in the latter cases are inconsequential. People feel how they vote is more important than how they rate a book, movie, or hotel, and thus the decision takes more thought. Maybe too much thought for most of us.
Whatever the merits of this reservation, I am intellectually intrigued enough to look into range voting further, but on a practical level I still find ranked choice voting the more attractive alternative. Ranked choice voting is better known, it has a political support infrastructure, and it has been tested a lot in the real world. (It has been used in other parts of the world for many decades.)
“Gaming the Vote” makes a good case for changing our electoral system, but it also inadvertently makes the case that theoretical debates about the best system may go on for a long, long time. To make headway the proponents of range voting will need to build political and intellectual support for the method, which is also going to take time (not to mention money and political skill).
We don’t have to wait that long to make things better. There is another dictum that applies here. It’s the old adage, “don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good."
September 22, 2008
Gaming the Vote is an impressive overview of the convoluted math and psychology behind different voting systems and the benefits and drawbacks of those systems.
OK, that probably sounds boring to anybody who isn’t a math and/or political science geek, but this book does a terrific, and often humorous, job of showing the reader the impact that plurality voting has had on the US Presidency (especially vote splitters – Ralph Nader wasn’t the first third-party candidate to impact an election) and how political consultants use our voting system to their strategic advantage. Poundstone then goes through the other electoral choices - range voting and approval voting receive the most review - and examines their histories, their strengths and their weaknesses. The book is a bit thin on what we actually can do to change our voting system, and the issue of the Electoral College is outside of his scope, but it is overall a very helpful start to understanding the issues involved.
OK, that probably sounds boring to anybody who isn’t a math and/or political science geek, but this book does a terrific, and often humorous, job of showing the reader the impact that plurality voting has had on the US Presidency (especially vote splitters – Ralph Nader wasn’t the first third-party candidate to impact an election) and how political consultants use our voting system to their strategic advantage. Poundstone then goes through the other electoral choices - range voting and approval voting receive the most review - and examines their histories, their strengths and their weaknesses. The book is a bit thin on what we actually can do to change our voting system, and the issue of the Electoral College is outside of his scope, but it is overall a very helpful start to understanding the issues involved.
January 16, 2014
3 stars + 1 for new useful information on a topic I am unread on.
Summary: Ranked voting systems are fundamentally broken (proven with math), plurality vote (American system) is *really* broken: major parties regularly fund extremist parties *on the other side* to try and splinter off votes from their main opponent. As a result, democrats regularly win deeply conservative states (and vice versa). Clearly an insane state of affairs. Range voting (i.e. give each candidate 1-5 rating) is the least broken, but politically difficult to enact because it disrupts the status quo of political consultants. Instant run-off voting is still a broken ranked system (what we use in Australia), but probably the most likely reform candidate in the US today because it would still preserve the two-party system - doesn't change the norm too much but allleviates some of the more egrerious vote splitting cases.
Summary: Ranked voting systems are fundamentally broken (proven with math), plurality vote (American system) is *really* broken: major parties regularly fund extremist parties *on the other side* to try and splinter off votes from their main opponent. As a result, democrats regularly win deeply conservative states (and vice versa). Clearly an insane state of affairs. Range voting (i.e. give each candidate 1-5 rating) is the least broken, but politically difficult to enact because it disrupts the status quo of political consultants. Instant run-off voting is still a broken ranked system (what we use in Australia), but probably the most likely reform candidate in the US today because it would still preserve the two-party system - doesn't change the norm too much but allleviates some of the more egrerious vote splitting cases.
January 11, 2020
Good critique of the election system of the US, with reviews of other possible voting methods we could use and what limitations those have as well. The author does give us what might be the best system, but allows that our chances of ever achieving it are slim.
July 22, 2019
Giving this 5 stars, because I think the subject is VERY important, especially now, and I'm not (yet) aware of another book about the topic that's even half-remotely consumable by the public at large, despite this one being a bit dense at times.
The first third of this book is about history of plurality voting (i.e. what the US has today ––electoral shenanigans aside) and its biggest flaw: spoiler candidates. My eyes started to glaze over a bit here because it's the exact same story over and over again (both sides have been bitten, although lately the right seems to do a better job of reigning it in than the left, which is depressing). Power through this part, or skip it. The Takeaway: our current voting method has a 11% rate of failure, which would be unacceptably high in any other government or commercial endeavor.
I was slightly annoyed at the author handwaving/choosing not to explain Ice Skating's "Great Flip-Flop" controversies, but as he recommends, searching the internet will turn up the admittedly complicated explanation: https://rangevoting.org/Skating1998.html
Before reading this book, I had heard of Instant Runoff Voting, and was convinced that the United States should reform in favor of that method. I now think Range Voting is the best, but IRV has the best chance of actually happening (although still remote, because corrupt politics knows how to cheat at the current game thus will do anything to defend it/lie to discredit any alternative), and Better Should Not Be The Enemy of Best. It's extremely disappointing that so many vain academics can't get their heads out of their asses thus are as vehemently divided as the general populace right now, and this is why voting reform hasn't happened yet. :(
PS - Hurricane Katrina was as horrible as it was because an corrupt official with KNOWN gambling debts was elected because of vote splitting bullshit, and unsurprisingly diverted resources from the army corps of engineers (overseeing the levees) in favor of riverboat gambling. Yay America. At least he's in jail now, after the fact.
PSS - Nader is a fucking egotistical asshole.
The first third of this book is about history of plurality voting (i.e. what the US has today ––electoral shenanigans aside) and its biggest flaw: spoiler candidates. My eyes started to glaze over a bit here because it's the exact same story over and over again (both sides have been bitten, although lately the right seems to do a better job of reigning it in than the left, which is depressing). Power through this part, or skip it. The Takeaway: our current voting method has a 11% rate of failure, which would be unacceptably high in any other government or commercial endeavor.
I was slightly annoyed at the author handwaving/choosing not to explain Ice Skating's "Great Flip-Flop" controversies, but as he recommends, searching the internet will turn up the admittedly complicated explanation: https://rangevoting.org/Skating1998.html
Before reading this book, I had heard of Instant Runoff Voting, and was convinced that the United States should reform in favor of that method. I now think Range Voting is the best, but IRV has the best chance of actually happening (although still remote, because corrupt politics knows how to cheat at the current game thus will do anything to defend it/lie to discredit any alternative), and Better Should Not Be The Enemy of Best. It's extremely disappointing that so many vain academics can't get their heads out of their asses thus are as vehemently divided as the general populace right now, and this is why voting reform hasn't happened yet. :(
PS - Hurricane Katrina was as horrible as it was because an corrupt official with KNOWN gambling debts was elected because of vote splitting bullshit, and unsurprisingly diverted resources from the army corps of engineers (overseeing the levees) in favor of riverboat gambling. Yay America. At least he's in jail now, after the fact.
PSS - Nader is a fucking egotistical asshole.
February 10, 2009
Gaming the Vote is a book for all those who are better test-takers than learners. I don't have much to add to what others have said about this book, which is fairly entertaining although eventually a bit on the redundant side. William Poundstone starts by explaining Kenneth Arrow's Nobel-prize winning mathematical proof that applying different "fair" voting schemes will yield different results, the upshot being that anyone familiar with the voting rules in effect can manipulate them to their advantage. In an ideal world we would all just strive to gather and share information about all candidates, reject attempts at dis- and misinformation, and vote in a way that honestly reflects our relative hopes and fears. Nah!
The author mertilizes this kind of pie-in-the-sky thinking by providing a lengthy historical analysis of split-voting in presidential and other elections (spoilers) and then thoroughly examining a wide variety of proposed voting schemes, their various (re)discoverers and proponents through the years (Louis Condorcet, Lewis Carroll, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., etc.), and the real and imagined consequences of their respective applications. As Poundstone puts it, "[w]hen hackers corrupt software, we blame the hackers. We also recognize that the software must be changed to prevent the hacking. A voting system is software. It describes how to compute a winner from the raw data of marked ballots. To be useful software, voting systems must work with people the way they actually are. Voters, candidates, and strategists can be insincere, scheming, spiteful, and even self-destructive. When such people are able to use the system to defeat the overall will of the voters, blame is properly laid on the system itself." (p. 130) In other words, you can't perfect people, only the systems people use.
Following an intriguing Bayesian analysis (a statistician's way of saying, "which outcome will bum people out the least?"), Poundstone concludes with a call-to-action in favor of range voting (see below) and a nifty glossary which sums up the different voting schemes and their weaknesses. Since we Americans don't have a parliamentary system that would lend itself to proportional representation and its voting correlates, I have chosen to paraphrase only that part of the voting bestiary contained in the book's glossary that is relevant to single-choice elections. In a nutshell, if this piques your interest as it did mine, I'm guessing you'll enjoy the myriad colorful characters, anecdotes, examples, and explanations that populate this book.
Plurality Voting - What we currently use. One person, one vote. Only plurality of votes is needed to win, so winner need not (and usually won't) be the unequivocal majority preference. Leads to "spoilers" in competitions among 3 or more choices, encouraging Machiavellians to support opponents who will bleed enough votes from the strongest candidate to give them a chance to come out on top. See Bush-Gore-Nader.
Approval Voting - Vote for as many of the candidates as you wish. Winner will be the option LEAST OBJECTIONABLE to the majority, not necessarily the favored choice (i.e., does not account for degrees of preference). Encourages blandness and homogeneity. No clear optimal strategy presents itself.
Borda Count - Rank all candidates by merit from 1 to X and count up the points to determine a winner (basically how the College Football polls work). Machiavellians can skew results by putting their strongest opponents at the bottom of their lists, arbitrarily depressing their score. See Oklahoma-Miami-Ohio State.
Condorcet Voting - Voters rank candidates by preference and winner will be the one with the most collective one-on-one round-robin victories. Requires computers to tally and can result in a statistical tie in rare cases of mathematical equivalence (rock beats paper beats scissors beats rock). Slight risk that winner will be the option LEAST OBJECTIONABLE to the majority, a la Approval Voting.
Range Voting - Rate the merits of as many of the candidates as you wish on a scale from 1 to whatever (see Goodreads, Amazon, Rotten Tomatoes, etc.). Highest average rating wins. I suspect that this system perverts into a Borda Count in a one-time voting scenario when more people try to vote "strategically" instead of honestly (leading to a classic prisoner's dilemma in which what I do is determined by what I think other voters will likely do). If so, this method arguably makes polls (horse race knowledge) as influential as candidate information (assessments of character, issues, and ability). Because this method hasn't been formally tried in a political context since Renaissance Venice, no clear optimal strategy presents itself beyond exaggerating one's immediate preferences. (See p. 247 for a cute binary version: Blagojevich - Hot or Not?)
Instant-Runoff Voting ("IRV") - Rank all candidates by preference. Lowest-vote getters are successively eliminated and votes thrown to the runners-up choices of those voters' until someone can claim a majority. Requires computer tallies, can take a while to calculate, and in closely-contested races converts the weakest candidates into kingpins, thereby promoting cultivation of fringe points of view. (A wickedly perverse example of this is provided on page 169.) That said, proponents of this method are said to include Howard Dean, Senator John McCain... and President Obama.
The author mertilizes this kind of pie-in-the-sky thinking by providing a lengthy historical analysis of split-voting in presidential and other elections (spoilers) and then thoroughly examining a wide variety of proposed voting schemes, their various (re)discoverers and proponents through the years (Louis Condorcet, Lewis Carroll, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., etc.), and the real and imagined consequences of their respective applications. As Poundstone puts it, "[w]hen hackers corrupt software, we blame the hackers. We also recognize that the software must be changed to prevent the hacking. A voting system is software. It describes how to compute a winner from the raw data of marked ballots. To be useful software, voting systems must work with people the way they actually are. Voters, candidates, and strategists can be insincere, scheming, spiteful, and even self-destructive. When such people are able to use the system to defeat the overall will of the voters, blame is properly laid on the system itself." (p. 130) In other words, you can't perfect people, only the systems people use.
Following an intriguing Bayesian analysis (a statistician's way of saying, "which outcome will bum people out the least?"), Poundstone concludes with a call-to-action in favor of range voting (see below) and a nifty glossary which sums up the different voting schemes and their weaknesses. Since we Americans don't have a parliamentary system that would lend itself to proportional representation and its voting correlates, I have chosen to paraphrase only that part of the voting bestiary contained in the book's glossary that is relevant to single-choice elections. In a nutshell, if this piques your interest as it did mine, I'm guessing you'll enjoy the myriad colorful characters, anecdotes, examples, and explanations that populate this book.
Plurality Voting - What we currently use. One person, one vote. Only plurality of votes is needed to win, so winner need not (and usually won't) be the unequivocal majority preference. Leads to "spoilers" in competitions among 3 or more choices, encouraging Machiavellians to support opponents who will bleed enough votes from the strongest candidate to give them a chance to come out on top. See Bush-Gore-Nader.
Approval Voting - Vote for as many of the candidates as you wish. Winner will be the option LEAST OBJECTIONABLE to the majority, not necessarily the favored choice (i.e., does not account for degrees of preference). Encourages blandness and homogeneity. No clear optimal strategy presents itself.
Borda Count - Rank all candidates by merit from 1 to X and count up the points to determine a winner (basically how the College Football polls work). Machiavellians can skew results by putting their strongest opponents at the bottom of their lists, arbitrarily depressing their score. See Oklahoma-Miami-Ohio State.
Condorcet Voting - Voters rank candidates by preference and winner will be the one with the most collective one-on-one round-robin victories. Requires computers to tally and can result in a statistical tie in rare cases of mathematical equivalence (rock beats paper beats scissors beats rock). Slight risk that winner will be the option LEAST OBJECTIONABLE to the majority, a la Approval Voting.
Range Voting - Rate the merits of as many of the candidates as you wish on a scale from 1 to whatever (see Goodreads, Amazon, Rotten Tomatoes, etc.). Highest average rating wins. I suspect that this system perverts into a Borda Count in a one-time voting scenario when more people try to vote "strategically" instead of honestly (leading to a classic prisoner's dilemma in which what I do is determined by what I think other voters will likely do). If so, this method arguably makes polls (horse race knowledge) as influential as candidate information (assessments of character, issues, and ability). Because this method hasn't been formally tried in a political context since Renaissance Venice, no clear optimal strategy presents itself beyond exaggerating one's immediate preferences. (See p. 247 for a cute binary version: Blagojevich - Hot or Not?)
Instant-Runoff Voting ("IRV") - Rank all candidates by preference. Lowest-vote getters are successively eliminated and votes thrown to the runners-up choices of those voters' until someone can claim a majority. Requires computer tallies, can take a while to calculate, and in closely-contested races converts the weakest candidates into kingpins, thereby promoting cultivation of fringe points of view. (A wickedly perverse example of this is provided on page 169.) That said, proponents of this method are said to include Howard Dean, Senator John McCain... and President Obama.
December 22, 2022
Like someone else mentioned, skip straight to the second part of the book, Solutions. The first half of the book is a waste of time.
May 8, 2016
I read this book during the 2016 election season, and it felt very timely. Poundstone's book is partly-historical and partly-analytical. It reviews the history of vote splitting in the United States, identifying situations where the "wrong" candidate (i.e., one not preferred by the voting populace) won due to the presence of third party candidates that shaved off votes. It talks about the Arrow Theorem that proved that any voting system fails a quite minimal test at least some of the time.
The book then has a section on the various potential replacements to simple plurality voting -- ranked voting (Borda count), Cordorcet voting (going through all of the head-to-head matchups), instant runoff voting, approval voting and, ultimately, range voting. Poundstone ultimately makes a reasonably good case for range voting.
While I enjoyed the above, Poundstone veers into a contemporary history of the arguments between champions of the various voting systems, which I found largely tedious. The various names were hard to keep track of and it seemed as if Poundstone felt he had to include the information because he had interviewed all of the experts -- not because it was particularly illuminating.
Reading this book in 2016, watching Donald Trump "win" primary after primary with less than 50% of the vote, I couldn't help but wonder how the GOP primary would have gone differently if the state parties had implemented ranked voting systems of some sort -- whether Borda, Condorcet, IRV, approval or range voting. It seems that ANYTHING other than the largely plurality-based or propotional systems that many states had in place likely would have ended up with a GOP nominee other than Mr. Trump.
After Gore's loss in 2000, the vote-splitting impact of Nader and Trump's rise in 2016, one might think that a movement to get away from plurality-based voting systems would be afoot in the United States. But you hear less of it now than you did 5 years ago (or 8 years ago, when the book was published). It's really a shame. The flaws in our current system are obvious. They have had a real impace on multiple important elections. While replacement systems are not without flaws, they are inarguably an improvement.
The book then has a section on the various potential replacements to simple plurality voting -- ranked voting (Borda count), Cordorcet voting (going through all of the head-to-head matchups), instant runoff voting, approval voting and, ultimately, range voting. Poundstone ultimately makes a reasonably good case for range voting.
While I enjoyed the above, Poundstone veers into a contemporary history of the arguments between champions of the various voting systems, which I found largely tedious. The various names were hard to keep track of and it seemed as if Poundstone felt he had to include the information because he had interviewed all of the experts -- not because it was particularly illuminating.
Reading this book in 2016, watching Donald Trump "win" primary after primary with less than 50% of the vote, I couldn't help but wonder how the GOP primary would have gone differently if the state parties had implemented ranked voting systems of some sort -- whether Borda, Condorcet, IRV, approval or range voting. It seems that ANYTHING other than the largely plurality-based or propotional systems that many states had in place likely would have ended up with a GOP nominee other than Mr. Trump.
After Gore's loss in 2000, the vote-splitting impact of Nader and Trump's rise in 2016, one might think that a movement to get away from plurality-based voting systems would be afoot in the United States. But you hear less of it now than you did 5 years ago (or 8 years ago, when the book was published). It's really a shame. The flaws in our current system are obvious. They have had a real impace on multiple important elections. While replacement systems are not without flaws, they are inarguably an improvement.
December 7, 2008
I learned so much from this book! I learned that when you click on one to five stars to rate a book on a site like this one, this is called "range voting," while the type of voting we do in US Presidential elections is called "plurality voting." This book isn't about voter fraud or no-paper-trail voting machines; it's about how, even when elections are run with the best of intentions in this country, their results are deeply vulnerable to weird mathematical skewing. So the person who winds up winning, fairly often, is not the candidate that the majority of the people would be happiest with.
Poundstone's discussion of vote-splitting (the phenomenon whereby Ralph Nader probably helped cause Al Gore to lose the 2000 election) is the clearest I've ever seen. His examination of the intricacies of voting is fascinating. He gets into game theory, social reform history, and some pretty disturbing election anecdotes (such as the "Wizard versus Lizard" gubernatorial fight in Louisiana in 1990, and Lee Atwater's entire ouvre of fear-based voter manipulation). He is clear-eyed about the issues with various election systems, such as Instant Runoff and Approval, which sound great on the surface but have dangers within. He ends on a hopeful note, revealing a couple of systems that actually seem to work quite well, both of which are infinitely fairer and more reliable than plurality voting, and both of which are being experimented with here in the US in various venues.
This book is smart, cogent, and often a riot. Highly recommended for anyone who votes in the USA.
Poundstone's discussion of vote-splitting (the phenomenon whereby Ralph Nader probably helped cause Al Gore to lose the 2000 election) is the clearest I've ever seen. His examination of the intricacies of voting is fascinating. He gets into game theory, social reform history, and some pretty disturbing election anecdotes (such as the "Wizard versus Lizard" gubernatorial fight in Louisiana in 1990, and Lee Atwater's entire ouvre of fear-based voter manipulation). He is clear-eyed about the issues with various election systems, such as Instant Runoff and Approval, which sound great on the surface but have dangers within. He ends on a hopeful note, revealing a couple of systems that actually seem to work quite well, both of which are infinitely fairer and more reliable than plurality voting, and both of which are being experimented with here in the US in various venues.
This book is smart, cogent, and often a riot. Highly recommended for anyone who votes in the USA.
January 23, 2011
Poundstone discusses various voting methods to contrast with the current plurality vote method of electing most public officials in the United States; a voting method which is often subject to the phenomenon of "vote splitting" by spoiler candidates, which has five times in US history led to the election of a president who failed to receive a majority of the popular vote.
He covers the dilemma of Kenneth Arrow's "Impossibilty Theorem" which states that no ranked-choice voting system can be designed to meet a set of common-sense voting requirements in every election; and then goes one to discuss the "Borda Count", "Condorcet Voting", "Cummulative Voting", "Rank Voting", Instant-Runoff Voting", "Proportional Representation", and "Single-Transferable Vote" systems of conducting elections. All of which avoid vote-splitting but are instead subject to other undesirable results. He illustrates the defects of each voting method using real-world voting patterns and evn specific election results.
In the end, Pounstone leaves the reader with the prospect of no perfect solution to the conundrum of undemocratic outc ome arising from democratic elections, but proposes numerous options to submit to a real-world field-test on a state-by-state or nationwide basis.
He covers the dilemma of Kenneth Arrow's "Impossibilty Theorem" which states that no ranked-choice voting system can be designed to meet a set of common-sense voting requirements in every election; and then goes one to discuss the "Borda Count", "Condorcet Voting", "Cummulative Voting", "Rank Voting", Instant-Runoff Voting", "Proportional Representation", and "Single-Transferable Vote" systems of conducting elections. All of which avoid vote-splitting but are instead subject to other undesirable results. He illustrates the defects of each voting method using real-world voting patterns and evn specific election results.
In the end, Pounstone leaves the reader with the prospect of no perfect solution to the conundrum of undemocratic outc ome arising from democratic elections, but proposes numerous options to submit to a real-world field-test on a state-by-state or nationwide basis.
November 29, 2008
Not to... spoil anything, but the answer to the book's subtitle is Range Voting, wherein candidates are scored, scores are added up (or averaged), and the winning score wins. (This is very different from Instant Runoff Voting -- my own city's voting method -- which, despite it's spoiler-free benefits, can still produce some odd results if three or more strong candidates are competing.)
In getting to the benefits of range voting, the author takes us on a geeky math-historical journey among voting theorists from Nicholas of Cusa to Lewis Carroll (!) to the mighty Kenneth Arrow (whose Impossibility Theorem the author explains coherently for the first time ever, then gently casts aspersions upon). Along the way you get lots of political intrigue and fuel for cynicism about "democracy", including a long dirty slog through the Louisiana governor's race of 1991 (the race David Duke almost won).
A fascinating, maybe even inspiring read.
In getting to the benefits of range voting, the author takes us on a geeky math-historical journey among voting theorists from Nicholas of Cusa to Lewis Carroll (!) to the mighty Kenneth Arrow (whose Impossibility Theorem the author explains coherently for the first time ever, then gently casts aspersions upon). Along the way you get lots of political intrigue and fuel for cynicism about "democracy", including a long dirty slog through the Louisiana governor's race of 1991 (the race David Duke almost won).
A fascinating, maybe even inspiring read.
July 13, 2024
This book is presented in 3 parts and 17 chapters. The prologue sets the stage by considering the problem of fringe and spoiler candidates who taint elections without having a real chance of winning. "Since 2004, the gaming of the spoiler effect has burgeoned and become thoroughly bipartisan. In the 2006 elections, no fewer than five key races had Democratic money funding spoilers to hurt Republicans or vice versa. The funds not only aided ballot drives but also paid for TV, radio, and print ads the spoilers could not otherwise have afforded" [p. 22].
Part I, Chapters 1-6 (pp. 23-130), defines the problem. Chapter titles are "Game Theory," "The Big Bang," "A Short History of Vote Splitting," "The Most Evil Man in America," "Run, Ralph, Run," and "Year of the Spoiler." We learn, among other things, that in a couple of figure-skating contests, the order of the top three contenders changed once a fourth skater performed and was scored below the top three. The figure-skating world was shocked and vowed to fix the scoring system. Similar anomalies can arise in the world of elections under certain voting systems.
Part II, Chapters 7-15 (pp. 131-258), discusses the solution. Chapter titles are "Trouble in Kiribati," "The New Belfry," "Instant Runoff," "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Cycle," "Buckley and the Clones," "Bad Santa," "Last Man Standing," "Hot or Not," and "Present but Not Voting." Among other ideas, advantages of the instant-runoff system (which is quite close to another system known as single transferable vote) are described. We also learn about Donald Saari, voting research's Bad Santa, because he spoils other researchers' fun by finding flaws in their proposed voting systems. Saari was once an advocate of approval voting, but later turned against it.
Part III, Chapters 16-17 (pp. 259-283), addresses the reality. Chapter titles are "The Way Democracy Will Be" and "Blue Man Coup." Near the end of this part, the author advocates for a real-world trial of instant-runoff, range, or approval voting. We can always go back to approval voting if the experiment doesn't work, but we must give some of these methods a try. Reform requires experimentation and courage to try new things.
Part I, Chapters 1-6 (pp. 23-130), defines the problem. Chapter titles are "Game Theory," "The Big Bang," "A Short History of Vote Splitting," "The Most Evil Man in America," "Run, Ralph, Run," and "Year of the Spoiler." We learn, among other things, that in a couple of figure-skating contests, the order of the top three contenders changed once a fourth skater performed and was scored below the top three. The figure-skating world was shocked and vowed to fix the scoring system. Similar anomalies can arise in the world of elections under certain voting systems.
Part II, Chapters 7-15 (pp. 131-258), discusses the solution. Chapter titles are "Trouble in Kiribati," "The New Belfry," "Instant Runoff," "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Cycle," "Buckley and the Clones," "Bad Santa," "Last Man Standing," "Hot or Not," and "Present but Not Voting." Among other ideas, advantages of the instant-runoff system (which is quite close to another system known as single transferable vote) are described. We also learn about Donald Saari, voting research's Bad Santa, because he spoils other researchers' fun by finding flaws in their proposed voting systems. Saari was once an advocate of approval voting, but later turned against it.
Part III, Chapters 16-17 (pp. 259-283), addresses the reality. Chapter titles are "The Way Democracy Will Be" and "Blue Man Coup." Near the end of this part, the author advocates for a real-world trial of instant-runoff, range, or approval voting. We can always go back to approval voting if the experiment doesn't work, but we must give some of these methods a try. Reform requires experimentation and courage to try new things.
November 2, 2019
This book gives an entertaining and informative tour of the most important voting systems (plurality, instant-runoff, Condorcet, Borda, approval, and range voting), their features and their problems. But this is no dry academic work: Poundstone's lively style, the large number of episodes from real live political situations (of U.S. history) that illustrate some of the effects (or defects) of plurality vote, and his letting the various academics he interviewed (Arrow, Brams, Saari, Smith, etc) to speak for themselves, all this makes the book a terrific reading to everyone interested in these matters. There is not a single piece of mathematical reasoning in the book, which is fine given those general readers to which it is intended, but this feature can leave other type of readers asking for more. And although this is a very fine book, the author is not exactly impartial: he clearly prefers Range Voting and leaves no doubt about it when he discusses the method in chapter fourteen. And he may as well be right... All in all: a great read!
October 16, 2018
Content-wise this is a great book. I really love how it dove deep into the various voting methods as well as the history and mathematics behind each. (Did you know that Lewis Carroll was big into voting methods?)
I just couldn't get over the structure of this book. The first half is just story after story of why the current system is flawed. These are in-depth and sometimes I felt they were just too long.
The second half is where the real "meat" of the book lies. This is where the pros and cons of the different voting methods are talked about. However, even in this section I found myself confused at times as to what was going on. The author weaves back and forth between different concepts without much guidance. I would have appreciated a bit more to have an example and then explain how that election would have turned out.
Again, I liked it. I just wish it had been written a bit better.
I just couldn't get over the structure of this book. The first half is just story after story of why the current system is flawed. These are in-depth and sometimes I felt they were just too long.
The second half is where the real "meat" of the book lies. This is where the pros and cons of the different voting methods are talked about. However, even in this section I found myself confused at times as to what was going on. The author weaves back and forth between different concepts without much guidance. I would have appreciated a bit more to have an example and then explain how that election would have turned out.
Again, I liked it. I just wish it had been written a bit better.
April 11, 2020
This is THE BOOK on introductory voting methods. And what a guide! Poundstone takes a subject that can be dry and tells you through stories just how screwed up our political process is. And he points to a culprit that most people are simply not aware of.
Beyond this, Poundstone doesn't just leave you without answers. He points to cardinal systems as a potential path, with his preference at the time being range voting. Poundstone provides all the nerdiness you could want in plain English.
This book is also responsible for kickstarting a lot of people's interest in the voting method reform movement. After you read it, you'll see why.
Beyond this, Poundstone doesn't just leave you without answers. He points to cardinal systems as a potential path, with his preference at the time being range voting. Poundstone provides all the nerdiness you could want in plain English.
This book is also responsible for kickstarting a lot of people's interest in the voting method reform movement. After you read it, you'll see why.
January 4, 2025
A highly enjoyable romp through the history of alternative voting methods and the mathematicians and theorists obsessed with finding the 'best' voting method. I give this book a top rating because I found the writing engaging and was satisfied with the intellectual framing of the material - a very difficult balance to reach, especially in such a comparatively obscure and technical subject. If you feel compelled to learn about and understand how scholars have conceptualized "optimal" voting systems, or have an interest in ranked choice voting or its alternatives, this is the best and most enjoyable point of entry i know.
June 22, 2023
Although, as promised, the author provides a reasonably easy access understand rundown of various voting systems, I found it more valuable for understanding what really happened when Ralph Nader ran against Bush and Gore. This episode into electoral history has been so graffitied over in the last quarter-century it was enlightening to have real details as we move into gearing up for next year’s primaries.
January 24, 2017
It caught my attention early on. Lots of history in the beginning. Later half of book discusses, in detail, various voting methods. that took a while to get through but I persevered. the first half is definitely worth reading. Second half is decent to explain why some voting systems are failures. Seems most are and he suggests a "fairest one of all ".
June 25, 2019
Solid book about different electoral reforms, situations where they would make differences, and relatively simple explanations of complex topics. The book includes many references to other works, so if you're looking to get intimate social choice theory or electoral reforms, this is a great book to start with.
February 15, 2021
As a die-hard opponent of the duopoly of corporate-owned political parties in the USA, I'm naturally drawn to alternatives to the plurality voting system that creates the spoiler effect. But which one? Math is not my strong suit and the nuances between RCV, AV & STAR make my head spin. Poundstone's excellent writing made me understand the differences more fully.
May 21, 2018
也许是选举的具体方式决定了一个国家具体的政治生态。没有数学上完美的选举制度。简单多数投票容易在同样观点的候选人中分流选票，所以最后变成2党竞争格局。如果换成了记分投票制，可能更适合更多小政党的存在。
December 31, 2020
Had to read this for my thesis, but very interesting and informative!
July 26, 2022
One of the best books I've ever read. Did a massive report on it during high school. Really in depth look at the history of voting and various voting systems.
March 27, 2023
I did not expect this to be as interesting as it was but I was so sucked in.
May 8, 2024
Fun read, good case for IRV, range voting, or approval voting
October 28, 2009
An interesting read with only a bit of new information. Much of the book is spent discussing the history of spoilers in elections. Most people will agree this is a problem unless they are busily taking advantage of said spoiler(therefore the title).
The author goes into historical solutions that have been proposed over time: Cordocet, Borda, single transferrable, IRV, approval, and the author's apparent preference, Range voting.
The arguments against most of these range from interesting to absurd and it seems mathematicians live to try to create implausible scenarios whereby somehow one of these alternate voting systems fails in a way that is somehow more terrible than *ahem* certain events in late 2000.
The most common argument against most of these alternate systems is possibility for 'Voter Manipulation.' I think it is actually one of the weakest imaginable arguments as we are currently hostage to voting our fears. Fear that the candidate we most dislike will get in if we stray too far from our current political Duopoly.
While the mathematicians concerns maybe valid (if rather unlikely and theoretical) the other opposition to alternate voting systems comes from the caste of political pundits and professional campaign advisors who have increasingly ensconsed themselves in solid policy positions as every day becomes election day all over and every decision must be weighed as though it is. (this is how we see your Karl Roves and Rahm Emmanuels in important positions in my opinion)
But 'Voter Manipulation'? Honestly I think that I prefer the statistically minut probable amount of 'Voter manipulation' than the Voters being manipulated by PR firms and the professional campaign crowd.
Still the author does seem to come in favor of some kind of reform and even he suggests that some critque of these systems on the part of the mathematicins and staticians is a case of 'the good being the enemy of the perfect.' Honestly he doesn't touch the professional campaigners much.
An interesting read, though beware a few of the analogies and illustrations, some of them are a bit loaded.
The author goes into historical solutions that have been proposed over time: Cordocet, Borda, single transferrable, IRV, approval, and the author's apparent preference, Range voting.
The arguments against most of these range from interesting to absurd and it seems mathematicians live to try to create implausible scenarios whereby somehow one of these alternate voting systems fails in a way that is somehow more terrible than *ahem* certain events in late 2000.
The most common argument against most of these alternate systems is possibility for 'Voter Manipulation.' I think it is actually one of the weakest imaginable arguments as we are currently hostage to voting our fears. Fear that the candidate we most dislike will get in if we stray too far from our current political Duopoly.
While the mathematicians concerns maybe valid (if rather unlikely and theoretical) the other opposition to alternate voting systems comes from the caste of political pundits and professional campaign advisors who have increasingly ensconsed themselves in solid policy positions as every day becomes election day all over and every decision must be weighed as though it is. (this is how we see your Karl Roves and Rahm Emmanuels in important positions in my opinion)
But 'Voter Manipulation'? Honestly I think that I prefer the statistically minut probable amount of 'Voter manipulation' than the Voters being manipulated by PR firms and the professional campaign crowd.
Still the author does seem to come in favor of some kind of reform and even he suggests that some critque of these systems on the part of the mathematicins and staticians is a case of 'the good being the enemy of the perfect.' Honestly he doesn't touch the professional campaigners much.
An interesting read, though beware a few of the analogies and illustrations, some of them are a bit loaded.
Want to read
February 12, 2008Ok ok ok, I admit that putting this on the 'to read' shelf is a bit disingenuous, because I really don't think I'm actually going to read it. There's too much Cortázar and Pynchon and Murakami in the world. But for those of you who have the time, this book sounds really interesting. This is from the Powells.com review:
While most Americans would characterize our electoral process as "one person, one vote," the route to the White House is considerably byzantine. For example, think of the system of primaries currently happening. I defy the average voter who lives outside of a caucusing state to describe accurately how that process works. As candidates begin to drop out of the race, many voters in states that have yet to hold primaries have lost the chance to vote for these candidates. Why do so-called "super-delegates" exist? Why exactly do we still utilize an archaic institution like the Electoral College?
I have also thought about those things! And this book sounds like it covers all this, and also how third-party candidates have no chance in our current system, and all sorts of other reasons why we're fucked. Then he talks about all sorts of other possible voting systems that we could try. Amazing!
So anyway, someone should read this and then summarize it for me. In return, I'll xerox my list of characters from Against the Day. Deal?
While most Americans would characterize our electoral process as "one person, one vote," the route to the White House is considerably byzantine. For example, think of the system of primaries currently happening. I defy the average voter who lives outside of a caucusing state to describe accurately how that process works. As candidates begin to drop out of the race, many voters in states that have yet to hold primaries have lost the chance to vote for these candidates. Why do so-called "super-delegates" exist? Why exactly do we still utilize an archaic institution like the Electoral College?
I have also thought about those things! And this book sounds like it covers all this, and also how third-party candidates have no chance in our current system, and all sorts of other reasons why we're fucked. Then he talks about all sorts of other possible voting systems that we could try. Amazing!
So anyway, someone should read this and then summarize it for me. In return, I'll xerox my list of characters from Against the Day. Deal?
February 19, 2019
Consider the standard system of voting in most of America: The voter is given a choice of roughly 2 -5 candidates and has to pick just ONE. This is commonly known as PLURALITY voting (or Majority voting). Pretty democratic right? Well it works pretty well in a lot of cases (especially if there are only two candidates) but it is to well known to be vulnerable to the what I'll call "The Gore-Nader Effect." That is two candidates who appeal to the same base can end up splitting the vote and hence causing the election of the less popular candidate.
My interest in "Gaming the Vote" was partially piqued because around Fall 2006 I had gone to a presentation at CMU given by Warren D. Smith about his research and advocacy for a new voting system he called "Range Voting". He argued that "Range Voting" was a way to beat "Arrow's Impossibility theorem" and presented simulations he had done that showed that "Range Voting" was better than any other system at minimizing "Bayesian Regret". It was an interesting and (to me) fairly convincing presentation.
I REALLY enjoyed this book, it has great explanations and covers a lot of different voting systems.
My interest in "Gaming the Vote" was partially piqued because around Fall 2006 I had gone to a presentation at CMU given by Warren D. Smith about his research and advocacy for a new voting system he called "Range Voting". He argued that "Range Voting" was a way to beat "Arrow's Impossibility theorem" and presented simulations he had done that showed that "Range Voting" was better than any other system at minimizing "Bayesian Regret". It was an interesting and (to me) fairly convincing presentation.
I REALLY enjoyed this book, it has great explanations and covers a lot of different voting systems.
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